GamePolitics - Comments for "Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behavior"http://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior
Comments for "Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behavior"enRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209482
<p>For those of you who still remember, the instruction booklet for the first Super Mario Bros. paints a darker story.&nbsp;The &quot;koopa tribe&quot; magically turned the peaceful inhabitants of the Mushroom&nbsp;Kingdom into bricks, plants and boulders. So even when you smash bricks, you are harming people!</p><p><a href="http://www.gamesnooper.com">GameSnooper</a></p>Fri, 10 Apr 2009 02:58:19 +0000JustChriscomment 209482 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209415
<p><style type="text/css"></style><div>I&nbsp;think the problem with a lot of these violence studies is they generalize the violence in the games.&nbsp;&nbsp; You have to play the games to see where the real problems are.&nbsp;&nbsp; Your not going to get gamers to go along with the idea that they cant slay&nbsp;enemy and feel like a hero in someway and get upgraded for it.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; You can however get more personal with the games that are being looked at and see there IS a problem.&nbsp;&nbsp; The developers them selves are adding little things that nudge the player into a more negative personality perspective. One that is socially hostile.&nbsp;&nbsp; You don't really want gamers for instance killing neighbors pets but in many of these games free kills[easy] of helpless pet or livestock animals is added as a &quot;fun&quot; part of games.&nbsp;&nbsp; What really needs to be looked at is the personality that the game is nudging the player to portray.&nbsp; Why do devs do this?&nbsp;&nbsp; Honestly I think some of them are playing a game of their own to see just how far they can push the envelope.</div></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:29:03 +0000nefermorecomment 209415 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209271
<p>Are you kidding me?&nbsp;Mario jumps on turtles to smash them out of their shells, stomps other critters into the ground, hurls fireballs at his enemies, and in general is just one badass of a plumber.</p><p>Speaking of which, the goombas look like poo in some of the games. Connection with being a plumber?&nbsp;I&nbsp;think so!</p><p>I will not buy securom games. <a href="http://www.wolvenmoon.com/sharedfiles/message1.jpg" title="http://www.wolvenmoon.com/sharedfiles/message1.jpg">http://www.wolvenmoon.com/sharedfiles/message1.jpg</a> and <a href="http://www.wolvenmoon.com/sharedfiles/message2.jpg" title="http://www.wolvenmoon.com/sharedfiles/message2.jpg">http://www.wolvenmoon.com/sharedfiles/message2.jpg</a></p>Thu, 09 Apr 2009 04:50:15 +0000Wolvenmooncomment 209271 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209199
<p>Huh...not sure why that double posted.&nbsp; Sorry!</p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:52:52 +0000Avalongodcomment 209199 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209198
<p>It is, of course, a matter of degree.&nbsp; Compared with JT almost anyone is going to seem like &quot;the voice of reason&quot;.&nbsp; It is worth noting that this research group has accepted grant funding from The National Institute of the Media and the Family in the past (and I think Dr. Gentile is actually on their board).&nbsp; Although&nbsp;this doesn't mean we should necessarily discard anything that they say,&nbsp;I think it could point to&nbsp;an obvious &quot;axe to grind&quot; with which we should be aware (particularly since the same group like to complain that any of their critics are &quot;in bed&quot; with the video game industry).&nbsp;</p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:48:11 +0000Avalongodcomment 209198 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209196
<p>Not really.&nbsp; I'd guess that a fair amount of students who are trying to &quot;go along&quot; with a study in the first place will also know enough not to admit dubiousness when asked.&nbsp; I'm skeptical by nature, sure, but I have concerns that these &quot;debriefings&quot; work as advertised, although that goes for all psyche research, not just&nbsp;VG studies.&nbsp;</p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:36:40 +0000Avalongodcomment 209196 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209195
<p>Gamers like to be rewarded in their games, it makes sense we would like to pass that feeling of accomplishment around! We're all a bunch if hippies at heart!&nbsp;<img alt="" src="http://www.gamepolitics.com/sites/all/modules/fckeditor/fckeditor/editor/images/smiley/msn/shades_smile.gif" /></p><p>--------------------------------------------------</p><p>I LIKE the fence. I get 2 groups to laugh at then.</p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:33:35 +0000DarkSabercomment 209195 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209190
<p>Janarius here, sorry I didn't include the definition of prosocial behaviours: &quot;...define prosocial behaviors as those intended to help others.&quot;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><a href="http://vgresearcher.wordpress.com/">http://vgresearcher.wordpress.com/</a></p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 18:51:04 +0000janariuscomment 209190 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209141
<p>I don't think they mean &quot;social&quot;&nbsp;as in getting along with people, but rather in participation with society.&nbsp; Mario Sunshine's pro-environment message would be a good choice for that -- presumably after playing, the subjects were observed placing their trash in appropriate receptacles on a more consistent basis.</p><p>Edit:&nbsp;on further investigation, it seems the level of sociability was determined by getting the subjects to pick out a selection of tangram puzzles for a partner who they were told would try to solve them quickly to earn a gift certificate, then seeing if they gave them the easier or more difficult ones.&nbsp; The pro-social players did trend towards giving the easier puzzles, and there was a greater difference between the pro- and the neutral versus the neutral and the anti-.&nbsp; Very interesting result.</p><p>---<br /> <b><a href="http://mammon.bz">The Mammon Philosophy</a></b></p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 17:30:52 +0000SimonBobcomment 209141 at http://gamepolitics.comRe: Study: Non-violent Games May Enhance Pro-social Behaviorhttp://gamepolitics.com/2009/04/08/study-non-violent-games-may-enhance-pro-social-behavior#comment-209148
<p>It does interest me that they specify <em>children's</em> behaviour.&nbsp; One of the key arguments of the adult gaming crowd is that M-rated games aren't made for children, and this appears to confirm that.&nbsp; But that said, I suspect the effects are more subtle than the report lets on.&nbsp; After watching a violent movie, people feel a little more aggressive; after a few sitcoms, they're relaxed and more cheerful.&nbsp; It's the same with games.&nbsp; You're going to get different reactions out of two people if one of them was just playing CoD4 and the other was on Kirby's Adventure.</p><p>The post on VG&nbsp;Researcher also mentions that the results determined prosociability and aggression weren't mutually exclusive -- it's a complicated spectrum.&nbsp; This is one of those cases where I suspect an awful lot of people are going to jerk their knees and end up banging them on the underside of the desk when they should be keeping cool and reading the full report.&nbsp; (And that's on both sides of the debate.)</p><p>---<br /> <b><a href="http://mammon.bz">The Mammon Philosophy</a></b></p>Wed, 08 Apr 2009 17:24:54 +0000SimonBobcomment 209148 at http://gamepolitics.com